Thursday, November 03, 2005

A Valuable Education, - maybe

I'll quote a couple of his paragraphs, 'cause here is another successful person showing his appreciation of current education.

"When an economy is young, dynamic and open, anyone can get ahead. All it takes is luck and pluck, as they say. That is when the economy is growing richer, and people are producing things they can sell at a profit. But when an economy becomes old and rigid, it shifts from making to buying...from earning to borrowing...from G.M. to Wal-Mart...from Detroit to Wall Street...from manufacturing to finance...from savings to debt...from ability to status...from what you know to who you know... and from how much you've learned to where you went to school.

We wonder, in fact, if all the time we spent in school was not a complete waste of time. We learn by reading, watching, listening and thinking. College seems like a way to avoid having to learn anything...by doing papers, taking tests and going to keg parties. This may not be true of engineers and scientists. But in our line of work, a college education may actually be a drawback. All it does is fill heads with whatever claptrap is popular at the moment. "

Society is changing.

The old industrial age is dying, and as free form capitalism that profited all is becoming an old boys monopoly game, only the old boys have access to the right game pieces. A few manage to work the system and profit, but overall connections are more important today than perseverance.

As government has grown it has destroyed small business through taxation and regulation. Knowledge and hard work are barely enough to overcome the anchor of socialism.

The result is that the poor have the primary method of self sufficient upward mobility denied them. The only route left is a diploma, and working for someone else.

The rich get richer, the poor get poorer; all because government destroys much of the value of personal initiative. There is however some good news.

There is a new society that will replace the industrial age. There is room for initiative in the information society, knowledge, adaptability, and integrity are once again rewarded. This is a society where learning is far more important than connections. This new frontier of capitalism is not yet weighed down with greedy governments stealing growth capitol to fund their bureaucracy.

This information age, the Netocracy, is a place that does not care who you know or what money or connections you have. Here you can make a difference in your own life. It won't be overnight, but your effort to learn will be rewarded.

The poor, the disenfranchised, the average joe; we have a chance again.